bee creative

treasures

Lunch break, sitting on the grass outside the building.

Two perspectives.

Things gathered.

Fabric from Jude.  There was a plan when it was cut out it but I don't remember.  A new opportunity now.

The lids contain dried pigment. Honey could have been added to keep it from cracking.  It could still be done.

The dahlia a gift from a friend, from her garden.  The bottom rock is crumbly enough that it might work for a pigment.  Both marking a special day and I will try making pigments from them.

The other rock I will keep for awhile.

A favorite book, Everyone Needs a Rock by Byrd Baylor and Peter Parnall.

I was doing a bit of research and had the thought that to hold a rock is a way to hold time. 

That making a pigment can be too.

That something made, telling a story, holds time. 

 

 

 

color transformations

A picture of the lily with the pollen removed, the ink made with the pollen layered underneath digitally. 

Goldenrod dye samples.

Silk, without a mordant, and two pieces of cotton, one soaked in aluminum triformate.

Using a mordant definitely makes a difference.

The rest of the goldenrod dye bath will be made into a lake pigment.

And then comparing the marigold and the goldenrod.  I used the same mordant for the marigold fabric. 

I was gathering up a few things and had the jar of rose petal ink in my hand, looked over at the paper and thought why not...pouring color over the paper is definitely the way to go.

This makes me think of stormy skies.

 

book mark

I decided a cloud book mark would be perfect for a book full of weather poems (Gigantic Cinema), but also thought this would be a great tree. 

It can be both.

The cloud is a threadcrumb.

I am not done yet...

Something quiet, something to listen to

Something quiet.

 

Currently reading (among other things), Gigantic Cinema.  It's a collection of poetry about weather edited by Alice Oswald and Paul Keegan. 

 

 

This gives a sense of the book.  Alice Oswald is mostly reading a selection of the poems in the book (Shakespeare, a passage from the bible, more contemporary poems too). 

I love what she says about weather being about light and about color.  As I read through the book (which I suspect will take me a long time), I will think about this.  What does each selection say about light?  What about color?

Something else to listen to, The Shipping Forecast on the BBC.

I found an article about it on the New York Times web site.

It's suggested as a method for falling asleep and is described as "poetic and hypnotic; a free-form ode to the seas."

Just after sunset, listening in the dark...

 

 

clouds, moons, dots...

I decided I wasn't going to dip these again.  This is the fabric with the clay rinsed out.

I love how the weave of the hemp shows up.

 

There were a few more sheets of paper this morning.

I read that it's better for beginner paper makers to start with more pulp in the water.  It made sense when the pulp was almost gone. 

Still, I was able to make some fairly thin paper.

For some reason there were bubbles.

I would love to know why.

And then I did what I wanted to do... which was paint the paper with ink.

It was wet enough that the paper became soft again but it wasn't a problem.  It actually became a creative possibility and I started to tear and rearrange the paper. 

The "clouds" were made by accident yesterday when I was transferring the paper off the screen and it ripped.  Now I want to make them on purpose.

I really love clouds.

another quilt square

No rain in this cloud, a happy summer cumulus cloud.

just beginning

Sunrise one day this week:

Layers of light.

Sorting I stacked a paper star on top of a painting I had done.

Hmm...

So here it is another version (three layers, one filter).

Another way to be.

I've shared this before but for those who wonder, the text is:

Crepuscular midnight stands at the road,

Where the stars have spilled from its purse.

You cannot go over the road past the fence

Without trampling the universe. 

"Steppe," by Boris Pasternak

Last night, when I couldn't sleep, I listened to a conversation with Katy Payne (On Being).  The discussion was about listening to whales and elephants.  

As I lay in the dark listening, I imagined there were whales singing deep in the ocean, right then at that very moment.  Elephants rumbling at a pitch just below what humans can hear.  

Something to think about in the middle of the night when it is dark and quiet.

Speaking of whales singing, Payne says:

"And so what that has done for me is to make me feel that what lies ahead to be discovered is absolutely limitless. We are not at the pinnacle of human knowledge. We are just beginning."

 

 

there but not

I think a lot on cloudy days about what is behind the clouds, what we know (or think we know) to be there...sun, stars, moon, planets, birds, the mountains, planes, birds or something else?

  It becomes imagined or remembered at that point.

The full moon as I arrived at home last night.

Focus.

Zoomed in, moon out of focus, color altered some, filtered...

Field notes: Rain, 45 F (not supposed to get any warmer than that), winds from the south, 17 MPH, gust of 24 MPH possible.  Deciduous trees cleared of leaves for the most part.

citizen scientists

After being intrigued by Nancy's post mentioning the blue hour, I've been taking some pictures of the sky just before dawn. 

I first discovered the term citizen scientist (more information about this here) when I was reading A Sideways Look at Clouds, found it again in Ways of Being, and then had someone mention the term in the pigment class I've been taking.

The term reminds me of a book I didn't read but was intrigued by and plan to read someday, The Scientist in the Crib by Alison Gopnik, Andrew M. Meltzoff, and Patricia K. Kuhl.

The scientific method:  Observe, research, hypothesize, test, analyze, and report.

The last instructional/discussion group meeting for my pigment class was last night.  While many of these things can be done without knowing the science, there is so much science involved.

It makes me think of the layer of science that is part of all that we do as humans, of how we experience the world and participate in life.

Field notes:  27 F/17 with the windchill.  Winds NNE 11 MPH, gusts to 20.  Clear skies.

 

someday I might figure out what I am doing

Didn't really expect it, but it's been a beautiful day. 

The last of the tomatoes were picked, a nice handful of parsley, one tomatillo, and this last handful of grapes.

The walnut vat got a really good stir.  No new walnuts to add this year.  The tree I usually collect them from didn't have much and they were very small. I wasn't fast enough to say "save me some anyway" before they were cleaned up.

All the houseplants have been brought in as well as this murky brew of fermenting indigo.  In a certain light it is turquoise. Tomorrow I am going to strain out the leaves, add some calcium hydroxide and see what happens.  I probably should have done this a week or two ago, not sure if it's too old now or if this will still work. There is also just a small handful more of indigo leaves that I might be able to try again with.

Stay tuned!